Don't be afraid of tapas

God can only be known by sadhana, only by becoming a sadhu, and a sadhu is not an ordinary person, he is a special being. Then you have a choice: either to be an ordinary person with all his attributes or to become a sadhu. That is, everywhere you have to choose, you need to understand this: - you will only go further with making a choice. Of course, you may choose not to make a choice, this is your own business, but then you will not become what you would like to become.

Any choice presupposes responsibility. Only when we accept responsibility for our choice is this choice actualized.

Suppose you want to achieve something but do not understand these principles, and you are not ready to take responsibility or sacrifice some of your limitations. In that case, you will not achieve this. We should understand that only sadhus achieve success on the spiritual path.

Every living being lives between life and death. The moment of death is an indicator for every creature, it shows a person what he has been meditating on all his life. If a person constantly thinks about worldly pleasures, about the opposite sex, then at the moment of death, his mind will involuntarily focus on this. It happens because it is very difficult to control thinking at the time of death. The texts say that the gaze of the death king Yamaraja is so intense and piercing that all the kleshas and sins come out of the human soul by themselves.

The point of death indicates how a person lived this life. Until a person has pacified his mind and purified it, has not found that place beyond death, he will not be able to be calm at this point. He will not be able to remain aware at this point, and his mind will inevitably become disturbed, clingy, and confused.

However, those yogis and sadhus who have purified their minds through worship of God, acting in a spirit of detachment, through meditation, for them this point does not pose a problem, and they will pass this exam. But in order to pass this exam, you must train continuously throughout your life while your body and soul are together.

Reason logically, if you cannot be aware, in a state of faith, meditative and calm in your ordinary state of life, what are the chances that you will be able to do this at the time of death? No chance. This means that you have to learn to be aware, learn to be in a state of faith and meditation in ordinary life. Not only under ordinary circumstances but also under stressful circumstances, in the circumstances of harsh tapas and harsh tests.

You do not have to be afraid of tapas; on the contrary, you should consider tapas as the most desirable. Only then can you pass this exam. When you enter the path of Dharma, remember that you have come to the monastery to do your tapas. Do not try to make your life very comfortable; do not try to gain anything in favour of your ego. Remember that you are on the path of tapas, and it is your choice, the choice that will temper your spirit.

By avoiding tapas, you are doing yourself a disservice. When you are on the path of tapas, tapas tempers your soul. But when you reject your tapas, when you reject sadhana, when you reject humility, when you reject obedience, when you reject renunciation, when you reject abandonment of attachments, know that your spiritual brothers, sisters, and senior monks will not condemn you. You cannot be forced to do tapas, but you will lose because you will not educate yourself, you will not prepare yourself.

This world may indulge you, but looking honestly and seriously, will Yamaraja indulge you? You should always remember that if somebody can indulge you, if you can indulge yourself, the universe will not indulge you. Even if you do something wrong, they will say to you: "All right, let us not create disharmony, let us not say anything to him, if that is what he wants, all right, let it be so. If you want this and not that, if you refuse tapas, if you ask for more, they will indulge you, but the law of karma, Yamaraja, will they indulge you? - "Well, okay, you do not want to die, - do not, okay. All right, you do not want to go to hell; you can go to heaven..."? The law of karma does not work like that; you must be ready to accept that the law of karma acts harshly and inexorably. You will not get pity from him; human emotions mean nothing to him. Your depression, your sadness, means nothing. So, get used to doing tapas in this life; as long as you are in a sober mind and have a clear memory to do tapas, it is easy to cut off attachments, and it's easy to cut off your ego.

Get used to being real sadhus, get used to being strong, and detached. Because if a fighter during a training battle does not have a strong opponent, then in a real battle he is killed in the first minutes. On the contrary, the fighter who constantly trains himself with a superior opponent, who trains himself to the edge of his capabilities, he has every chance of staying alive and winning. Your whole life is training, if during training you do not give all your best, speaking in the language of athletes, "slack off", how can you win in a real fight? In the real universe, ruthless forces operate, they can be pacified only with your spiritual wisdom, your spiritual strength.

But now you are educating yourself every day and every moment in relationships, in service; this is your training battle. You have to live so that every day in this training battle, you act as if it is real.

A real sadhu remembers his tapas, he is strict with himself, not with others, but with himself. A true sadhu remembers his choice 24 hours a day. A real sadhu never cherishes worldly desires, attachments, or thoughts of the world. A real sadhu does not live for himself but for others and for God. All this is tapasya, spiritual austerity. Do not encourage the ego in yourself, do not encourage attachments in yourself, do not encourage anything in yourself that does not belong to the Dharma, do not encourage maya in yourself, do not encourage unclean thoughts, criticism of others in yourself, do not encourage laziness, absent-mindedness, do not encourage yourself to be irresponsible. You are yogis; your concentration should be many times greater than that of other people. Be focused and alert. Sometimes you can see another person acting neglectfully, not concentrated, not focused, not organized, but calling himself a yogi, how can that be?

Make efforts to fulfil the instructions of your guru, to fulfil the instructions of the senior monks, to fulfil the instructions of the sadhu culture. But do not contract your mind, if you want to make efforts and create some image of yourself as a perfect sadhu, start doing it from an egoic state, you will only contract your mind, it will become a new form of your ego: "I want to appear good to others, so I am concentrating on that". But a sadhu acts from an open mind, from a state of awareness, and it comes naturally.

Learn to develop such qualities in you that you can be entrusted with any service and handle it. This field of cultivating concentration and responsibility, it is here, it is now. Concentration and responsibility are optional even if you are engaged in some simple service. It is just that this concentration and responsibility, as opposed to worldly responsibility and concentration, is within the sadhu. Moreover, we must train ourselves to act with full responsibility and concentration.

One person lived in an ashram where he constantly got up at 4 in the morning. At 4:30, the morning group practice of worship (puja) began, and he would always oversleep, and the temple attendant would always wake him up. When he woke up, he would say, "Get up, prabhu! This is very beneficial!" And he answered: "Let it be beneficial in an hour and a half."

Tapas means we have inner zeal. Through this zeal we are freed from karmas and kleshas. The problem is that such inner zeal is most often shown by neophytes, and they have it for a year, maybe two, three, but then their inner zeal begins to blur somewhere, since it is difficult to maintain the same regime for many years. But tapas is precisely the manifestation of inner zeal for many years, perhaps for many tens of years. Such a yogi, who can show inner zeal in spiritual practice, is the best and will have the best results.

So, if you ask the question: "In what way should sadhana be practised? You can answer this way: "By the way of tapas." It was because of tapas that the gods took their position in heaven. Thanks to tapas, Dhruva became the God of the pole star, and Arjuna received the blessing of Shiva and ascended to the worlds of Indra Loka. Rishi Vasishtha acquired the status of the son of Brahma, Rishi Vishwamitra, having changed his caste, became an outstanding Brahmarishi.

Tapas in Vedic and modern culture and reality

One day, Yudhishthira ordered Arjuna to practice on Rishi Vasishtha's advice to obtain a magical weapon before fighting the Kauravas. Then he decided to meet with Indra (Shakra) and Shiva (Shankara), grabbed his bow and sword and went north to the Himalayas. Then, he entered the dense forest of Kantakito. It was the abode of pilgrims, rishis, and gandharvas, full of animals, rich in flowers. As soon as he entered the forest, the sound of shells and drums in the sky was heard, and the flowers were waking up, that is, there were auspicious signs.

Having ascended the mountain, he settled on the Himavat ridge; there was a very favourable area, pleasant singing of birds, peacocks and cuckoos lived there. Entering this forest, Arjuna was delighted with the nature of this place. He liked it very much, and with a joyful heart, he went into the forest, dressed in rough cloth, took a stick, took off his royal robes, put on a skin and prepared a place for practice. First, he ate the fallen leaves, then he decided to eat one fruit every three days. He ate one fruit every six days in the second month, and in the third month, he ate only on the full moon.

In the fourth month, he ate air. All this time, he stood in vrikshasana (tree pose), raising his hands, performing the traditional practice of tapas, the whole time holding only by the toes of one foot, he was engaged in reciting mantras and contemplation.

This was noticed by the rishis. They came to Shiva to tell him that Arjuna had indulged in the cruel practice of asceticism and mortification of the flesh, wanting something, obviously to get something. Bowing to Shiva, they praised Arjuna: "The magnificent son of Prithi stands on the Himavat ridge, from his terrible ardour, from his standing, the sides of the world were covered with a haze, but we do not know his goals, the fire of his austerity scorches even our world, lest imbalance comes from this, it must be stopped. "Then Shiva said: "Do not worry and return on your paths, his goal is known to me, he does not want either heaven or dominion, but what he wants, I will give him"...

This is one of the classic examples of how ascetic practices are described in Vedic literature, their meaning, form of implementation, circumstances, results, etc.

Vasishtha continued: "... Once, there was a famine in the country of Parigha. Frustrated to the depths of his heart by the sight of suffering people and seeing that all his attempts to alleviate the situation remain unsuccessful, Parigha, in secret from people, went into the forest to perform harsh rituals. He lived on dry leaves and received the name Parnada. After a thousand years of torture of the flesh and reflection, he reached an understanding of the Truth and freely travelled in all three worlds. "

This quote obviously talks about Iran and its ruler. There was a different culture at that time. If there were problems in the state or politics, and the king saw that he was not coping with his duties, he began to perform tapasya.

Now, of course, we will not see that when demonstrations or strikes arise, the minister says: "I will go to the forest and do sadhana, tapasya, meditate, eat leaves, so that the state flourishes." Everyone would think that he is ill.

This is a sadhu culture, a different mentality. Sadhu culture says that any problem can be solved if you do tapas. Sadhu culture is based on tapasya. If you do tapasya, you can solve your inner problems. By solving your inner problems, you will gain such a strong mind that you can help others solve their outer problems.

We follow this culture, so we can solve any of our problems with tapasya and the fortitude that is manifested through tapasya.

Tapasya is not only about going to the forest, eating leaves, air, meditating, reciting mantras. Everything you do against your ego, but for Divinity, for carrying out the divine will, is tapasya. Seva is tapasya, obedience is tapasya, meditation is also tapasya. Daily discipline, when from year to year, without having fun, without being distracted, visit the same temples, perform the same sadhanas, practice the same bhajan mandalas - these are all tapasya. When we learn to cut off our egoism, to live for others, this is tapasya. We just need to understand this and get used to living in the tapasya style.

It is not easy at first. This tapasya can awaken many of your karmas, a lot of your egoism will come out from within, many of your illusions, and it will push you against them, and it pushes you every day. Tapasya will get it all out of you - that is how good it is. Let it be, let it happen, but do it right. When it brings it out, it has to dissolve it all. It will sublimate it all, dissipate it. It will show you your illusions and, at the same time, show you the way to free yourself from illusions.

Therefore, those who practice for a long time, spend time next to the Master, live in tapasya - they change, they move towards real holiness because it's impossible not to change. If a rod is put into a fire, how will it not change? The rod becomes red-hot. However, if the tapasya fire is too strong for you, then you do not need to enter this fire directly; you should take the place where it does not burn you, but you are not cold either, you are warm from the fire.

Khaidakan Baba said: "The Master is like fire. You should not sit too far away becouse you will not get warm. But before you approach, consider whether you are ready to burn." Each of you must choose a place near this fire so that it is not cold. If Vasishtha is far away, we will be cold.

Monastery, Divya Loka, Dharma - this is the whole space of tapasya, if we penetrate into it. Tapasya means we are kindling the inner flame, brahma-tejas. Tapasya is translated as "burning, ignition". The energy ignites in the channels, begins to purify, our faith ignites, our spirit of the sadhu ignites, our striving for God ignites. Without this, it is impossible to remove all karmas, all ego, we have to be inflamed. A sadhu is not an indifferent and soulless being who is a little aware. A sadhu has a flame in his heart; this flame is of a divine nature - it is a flame of faith, devotion, and awareness. All this is the result of tapasya.

It is easy to start tapasya in a fit of inspiration, but it is challenging to do it all your life. Whoever does tapasya on an impulse, his impulse goes away after a month, tapasya ends, and samsara begins. We do the opposite, we gradually increase our tapasya. First, through service (seva), through the ability to cast aside your egoism, through self-discipline and routine. We are building up our tapasya so that over time it becomes stronger and larger. And if we follow our tapasya correctly, our Atma-shakti, our spiritual strength only increases over the years.

To change yourself

Sometimes they ask: "How to make sure that this person not be so harmful? How to make him change his mind and become imbued with the dharma?" I say, "Leave others alone, let them live their lives. If you cannot change yourself, how can you change another?"

We must start with ourselves. Changing yourself is the best tactic. And when we have changed ourselves, we see that others are also changing, because the world is a manifestation of our consciousness; it always responds to our inner mood and spiritual state. But often, if our mind is turned outward, for some reason, we try to change others, but we do not seek to change ourselves.

Many people strive to study complex techniques, to study the heights of philosophy, but they forget that all this works only under certain conditions, namely when we are ready for it. You have to start with yourself. If we ourselves are not ready, if we have not purified ourselves, then the greatest teachings, the greatest teachers, the most secret practices and techniques will not work. Therefore, the principle is this: when entering the teaching, we always start with ourselves. We look into ourselves and think: "What do I need to change in myself?"

He who does not control anger, and impure thoughts and may manifest hatred cannot attain Liberation. He who does not have humility, love, and does not strive to see God in everything, also cannot attain Liberation. He who speaks evil, violates samaya, has arrogant consciousness, will also fail. These are all obstacles, inner barriers. Following the path of teachings, receiving transmissions, studying philosophy, one should always look more closely into oneself.

There is discerning wisdom (viveka) within us, and we need to activate the principle of viveka in ourselves. With the help of discerning wisdom, one should discover what is necessary, right, and pure in us and build upon it, and from what is unnecessary, wrong, and impure, distance oneself, to not maintain it in oneself.

When we try to turn inward, change ourselves, develop a different attitude to our life, and try to be attentive to ourselves, then we truly become a sadhu, we can receive real fruits from the teaching.

A yogi, a man of the Path, must always be able to make the right choice, and making this choice, he must have the ability to respect it, be responsible for it. If we choose the path of Liberation as a value, and then do something that is not connected with it, this means that our values ​​do not become our goals.

Many people manage to understand some of the meanings of advaita, some even manage to acquire spiritual values, they manage to recognize the path of Awakening as valuable, but very few people can translate values ​​into goals. It turns out a mismatch, the person says: "I really appreciate it, I believe in it, I respect it. It is so wonderful to attain Liberation, to become a jnani, an Enlightened One, and maybe even a siddha, to be free from this samsara." But when you ask him: "Do you practice anything specifically?" he, expressing confusion, replies: "No, since there is no way I can get my act together and do all this." This means that values have not yet become goals.

It resembles a situation in which a person watches football and says: "Football is great. I'm a very avid football fan." You ask: "When was the last time you touched the ball?" – and he says: "I cheer on TV."

To avoid being such an absentee "jnani", we need to translate our values ​​into specific goals. The specific goal is sadhana. When we translate our values ​​into goals, everything becomes very simple: if our goal is sadhana, then why not fulfill it? It means that we practice, we fulfill it. It is all about practice. Practice does not mean leaving everything behind, living in the mountains and only doing practice. For many, this is not possible due to social responsibilities. Instead, you need to fill your whole life with practice. This is possible if you have sufficient intention. When our goals become our actions, then we become real sadhus walking the path of Enlightenment.